Terminator 6 Director: Sarah Connor Could Beat Liam Neeson in a Fight

Terminator 6 director Tim Miller thinks returning Sarah Connor actor Linda Hamilton could beat up her fellow “older” action star Liam Neeson. The 61-year-old Hamilton has officially jumped aboard the planned Terminator follow-up to be directed by Miller and produced by James Cameron. The movie reportedly will be a direct sequel to Terminator 2: Judgment Day, ignoring the events of the three sequels that came in-between.

Linda Hamilton first played Sarah Connor in the original 1984 Terminator, which saw her joining forces with a warrior from the future to fend off a cyborg killer sent back in time to prevent her from giving birth to humanity’s savior. In Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Connor had evolved from a scrappy survivor into a true cold-blooded warrior, and Hamilton became a female action movie icon in the process. Hamilton has not been involved in the Terminator franchise since Judgment Day, and her character has since been handed off to other actors; namely, Lena Headey (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) and Emilia Clarke (Terminator: Genisys).

Speaking to THR, James Cameron and Tim Miller discussed how they came to cast Hamilton in the new Terminator, bringing her back to the role that she made famous. At 61, Hamilton is much older than your typical female action hero, but according to Miller and Cameron that is actually one of the movie’s major selling-points. Miller explained the importance of having Hamilton play the role of Connor at her “advanced” age, and gave a clue about how the character will continue evolving:

As strong a character as she was, as meaningful as she was to gender and to action stars everywhere, I think it’s going to make a huge f–king statement to have her be the really seasoned warrior that she’s become.

Cameron noted that while there aren’t many female action stars over the age of 60, there are plenty of men who are still out there doing the action thing at that age and beyond. Miller then joked about bringing in one of the most-noted older action heroes around so he might learn a lesson in butt-kicking from Hamilton:

Which is why we’re bringing Liam Neeson in as the bad guy. And she is going to kick his ass. (Laughs.)

“She f–ks him up,” Cameron agreed. Though Neeson has officially retired from action movies, perhaps he would reconsider that position to have the honor of getting beaten up by Linda Hamilton?

Cameron and Miller’s remarks about Hamilton’s importance as a female action movie icon are interesting in light of Cameron’s own recent controversial comments about Wonder Woman, where he suggested that the superhero was treated as too much of a sex object and was too uncomplicated as a character. Cameron says Sarah Connor as created by Hamilton was a true action hero because she was “crazy” and wasn’t there to be “ogled.” The director took a lot of heat for his comments but he isn’t backing down from them, reiterating to THR that he believes Gal Godot’s Wonder Woman was too sexualized and that there was nothing groundbreaking about the film.

Whether you agree with Cameron’s Wonder Woman remarks or not, there’s no question that he’s right about Hamilton’s stature as one of the most important female action stars of her era. Bringing Hamilton back at 60+ to play Sarah Connor and kick some more cyborg butt in Terminator6 could make a powerful statement indeed. Watching her actually beat up Liam Neeson would only add a little icing to the cake, though it’s unlikely that will actually happen (she’ll have to settle for terminating some other killing machine instead).